Halloween Yard Decoration Tips: Graveyards, Yard Props, and More

Boo! These Halloween yard decoration tips and ideas will help
you get the attention of anybody passing by... whether hosting a big haunted house or just looking to spook some trick o' treaters. Including how to make a Halloween graveyard, how to pick (or make yourself) freaky Halloween yard props, and how to set it all up to look its
very spookiest, you'll find it here.

Making a Halloween Graveyard Buying or Making Fake Tombstones

A Halloween graveyard is one of my favorite Halloween yard decoration ideas. There are lots of ways to do this, from an elegant and subtle
Southern cemetery to a twisted and Hellish zombie playground. Have fun with it!

No matter how you decide to make graveyard for Halloween, you'll need to have tombstones. If you're short on time but still want to have
a cool-looking yard cemetery, you can just buy the gravestones and cemetery materials online. They sell everything from realistic looking
gravestones to skulls to zombies crawling from the dead, to cemetery signs. Have fun with it.

But if you're the creative type and want to save money by making fake Halloween tombstones or other Halloween yard decorations at home, it's really not too hard. Even if you don't
feel like spending weeks creating tombstones, you can even make just a few extra (letting the kids help can be fun) to supplement your purchased
Halloween yard decorations.

I love this simple Halloween decoration gravestone. The way it's strangely bent like something from a nightmare. Or Hell. Or a Tim Burton movie. The little red window at the top also lights up from the inside (operates with batteries).

This fake coffin is almost life-size, and looks like it's been rotting in the ground for a couple of decades.

A very cool addition to a graveyard scene-- a little pricey, though, so only for those who want to go all-out.

Tombstone Materials

In general, homemade Halloween gravestones are made from either plywood, cardboard, or styrofoam. My favorite
material to use? Styrofoam.

Why use styrofoam. I like styrofoam for tombstones and other Halloween yard decorations because it makes great 3D shapes, is ultra easy to work with, doesn't weigh a thing, and it's already got a
pebbly texture that makes it the perfect medium for making Halloween tombstones. For the best result, look for sheets of styrofoam more than
two inches thick. Styrofoam insulation works well, too.

The only thing to keep in mind when building Halloween tombstones from styrofoam is that this material can be a little fragile. So be careful
when working with it not to break pieces off. While you can paint over it (and it actually doesn't give a bad effect to the overall look), it can be
annoying to have to paint over broken white spots.

Cutting Tombstone Shapes

You can definitely have a good time playing with shapes for your Halloween yard decoration tombstones. The
traditional tombstone shape is, of course, a rectangle with rounded corners at the top. But you can also do a Celtic cross, a strange and twisted
gravestone, whatever you like. My suggestion? Start with simple shapes and work your way up from there, if you like.

If making your Halloween graveyard from plywood, you'll need a jigsaw. For styrofoam, you can just use a big utility knife-- another reason I like
working with this material. Be sure to draw your shape onto your material before starting to cut. To get subtler shapes with a stryofoam tombstone, simply use a coarse grade of sandpaper and sand away.

Decorating Halloween Tombstones

At your local home improvement store, you'll see that they sell tons of different shades and textures of
stone-like paint (the stone-textured paint works best). Play around and find what works best for your own Halloween yard decorations. The
traditional is, of course, dark grey.

Now comes the fun part: time to add the epitaph. If you look online, you'll find tons of ideas for creepy or funny Halloween epitaphs. I like the
ones at corsinet, or you could just Google it. Either paint your epitaph on free-hand,
or use stencils to get professional-looking letting. Also add any other designs you want: creepy faces, skulls, curly-q's, whatever. The only limit
is your creativity (and maybe your artistic ability).

Examples of Funny Halloween Tombstone Epitaphs

I. B. Ded

Frank N. Stein

Will U. Joinme

I. L. Beback

Otta B. Alive

Fester N. Rott

Ima Rotten

Tombstone Decoration Tip: When working with styrofoam, it's best to press any shapes (lettering, designs, etc.) into the styrofoam itself before
painting it. This will give all lettering and designs a very real 3D look-- which is exactly what you want. A blunt-ended object works best for this.

Setting Up your Halloween Graveyard

Installing your Tombstones

You'll want to come up with a tombstone arrangement so that your Halloween yard decoration looks realistic. I like
to make mine a bit haphazard so it looks unkempt. When you know how you're going to arrange them, install a couple of large plant stakes in the bottom of
your styrofoam tombstones. This will keep them firmly rooted in the ground.

Creating Ambiance

Even a great graveyard for Halloween needs a little ambiance to look its best. Forget to mow your lawn a few weeks before
Halloween. Hang cobwebs from the trees, along with fake spiders of all sizes. Add a creepy fake crow or two and some bloody skulls. Even
add a ground-breaking zombie to make it look extra freaky. Things light lighting, glued-on bits of Spanish moss, etc., can make the different
between an ultra-scary cemetery and a so-so graveyard.

Decorating Your Graveyard

Some more tips on decorating a Halloween graveyard are:

Buy or make bones, skulls, or zombies to use around gravestones.

Collect dead leaves in the weeks before Halloween and sprinkle them naturally around the graves.

Add creepy dead (or black silk) flowers to some of the graves.

Let the grass grow long around your gravestones in the weeks before Halloween.

Place Jack o' Lanterns near gravestones and other Halloween yard decorations.

Put up a Halloween graveyard fence to mark the path (also keeps your cemetery from being trampled).

Mound earth in front of your graves to make them look freshly-dug. And maybe a shovel?

Haunting Your Yard with Halloween Yard Props

You don't need to build a Halloween graveyard to have a creepy Halloween yard decoration. With a few simple-to-make props (or a few cheap
store-bought ones) you can create plenty of spookiness without a lot of effort. Below are a few of my favorite simple projects for making
Halloween yard props.

More interested in buying props? Look a little further down the page for ideas on which ones to choose.

Homemade Tree Ghosts

Making ghosts to hang from trees for Halloween is really fun and really easy. In fact, it's so much of both of those things that you may make
more ghostly Halloween yard decorations than you actually need.

To make a ghost, all you need is a small white garbage bag and a ball of some kind. What do you do? Simple place the ball in the top of the
trash bag, secure the bag underneath the ball with a twist tie or rubber band, and draw a face on with a black permanent marker. Then hang
them everywhere. This is a great Halloween craft for kids!

Tip: You can also use newspaper or styrofoam globes to stuff the head of your ghosts. Newspaper makes this an ultra cheap (and green!) Halloween project.

Build Your Own Halloween Mummy

Making a mummy for a Halloween yard decoration requires a teeny bit of carpentry, but it's actually pretty easy. All you need to do this project
is two thin lengths of wood, some old and disposable used clothes, some old newspapers, and a bunch of white bandages. Easy as could be.

1. To make your mummy, make the shape of a "T" with two boards that are about two inches thick each. The taller board should be the height
you'd like your mummy to be at the shoulder, and the shorter board should be the width of his shoulders. Place this frame in the ground or on a
stand.

2. Attach your old clothes (pants and a shirt) to the frame. You may need to staple the pants in place. Stuff with newspapers to give it shape,
and tape the shirts and pants together securely (don't worry-- the duct tape won't show, so feel free to use it wherever you need to).

3. For a head for your mummy Halloween yard decoration, either use a styrofoam head on a spike, a plastic skull, whatever you like. It'll be
covered with bandages (unless you want to leave a scary face showing, as pictured), so only the shape is important. Be sure to attach it securely with more tape.

5. Decorate as desired. You can use spray
paint to make it look ancient, or add fake blood, or give it a weapon... whatever you like! If you can find plastic scarab beetles, they make a very
cool addition when glued on and around your mummy.

Specialty Halloween Yard Props

Most large Halloween yard props are a little on the pricey side, and are generally good only if you've got plenty of storage space. They don't
break down into very small parts, and so are hard to store for many people. However, if you're really dedicated to Halloween and have a bit extra
to spend on your Halloween yard decorations, you might want to invest in a few large Halloween prop decorations.

Pricing for large Halloween yard props varies hugely. Some are almost full-sized and as cheap as $15 while others are more sturdy, detailed,
and expensive. Still others will be animated, intricate, and value in the thousands of dollars (really!). You won't find any of that last variety here,
as these sorts of props are generally used professionally in haunted houses and the like. You'd have to be really dedicated to Halloween
to buy one for your own home!

Lifesize Hanging Skeleton Ghost measures over 5' high and has posable arms. Made of Styrofoam, Iron Wire, Cotton, Plastic and Polyester. For indoor or covered porch use only. Has posable arms and string on top for easy placement. WARNING: Choking Hazard. Small Parts. Not for children under 3 years. Keep away from flame and direct heat.

It's amazing how something so simple can be such a cool Halloween yard decoration. Place these disembodied arms, legs, and skull in the grass.

Also lights up.

You a Demented Decorator, Too? Show off Your Freaky Halloween Decorations!

Have an awesome ability to create a spooky Halloween scene? Here's the place to show off your Halloween decorations --body parts, graveyards, homemade zombies, bloody living rooms-- and let other visitors vote on their creepiness factor.

Or browse around to see what other people have done to freak out their guests on Halloween and get a few demented ideas of your own...

Your ideas and photos will appear on a Web page exactly the way you enter it here. You can wrap a word in square brackets to make it appear bold. For example [my story] would show as my story on the Web page containing your story.

TIP: Since most people scan Web pages, include your best thoughts in your first paragraph.